Prince Fahad bin Faisal Al Saud
is a grandson of the brother of the Saudi Arabian
king. He could
easily be living the high life at home in Saudi Arabia, but
instead he's made a name for himself as a tech entrepreneur and
social media evangelist.

After graduating from Stanford
with a degree in Mechanical Engineering (and a double minor
in Management Science and Middle Eastern Studies), Prince Fahad
was hired as the Head of User Operations for Facebook Arab, where
he helped launch of Facebook in Arabic in 2009.

"Facebook is the reason
I'm not going for an MBA right now. Facebook was my MBA. Facebook
was my PhD," said Fahad in an interview with Business Insider.
"[Working at Facebook] was the most educational opportunity I
ever could have asked for. It was amazing to be working on a
project that could change people's lives."

And change lives it did. Since
the dawn of the Arab
Spring in late 2010, there's been much talk of the role that
social media, particularly Facebook, has played in various
revolutions across the Arab World. But Fahad sees Facebook as a vehicle for social
change rather than an independent force. "Social media is a tool," he
said. "It's no
different than the telephone, the television, a
hammer. But it has
forced a lot of people to be more transparent and to be held
accountable for what they say."

He also sees social media as
helping to drive job creation in the Middle East and around the
world. "It gave a lot of
people opportunities for work, creation, innovation, startups. We
have a huge generation of entrepreneurs who wouldn't have had
that opportunity without these social networks," he said.

Since leaving Facebook in
August 2011 he's also helped found several tech startups,
including Na3M
Games and Appiphany.Na3M (New Arabic Media) focuses on creating
multi-platform games with an Arabic
twist. "We wanted
to create content that focused on our identity and culture as
Arabs," said Fahad. "It's a great feeling to be proud of
something that you have contributed to and that has helped to
empower the region."

Appiphany makes slick apps that
are like catnip for
social media junkies. One of their most popular apps isInstaFeed,
a program that allows Instagram users to divide the friends they
follow into specific "channels" that can be turned on and
off.

He also invested heavily in
Popover Games, a maker of cross-platform social-casino games,
where he helped to develop a auto-translating chat program that
allows players of different languages to communicate via
gaming.

"At Popover we wanted to create
heritage games, games have been played for centuries and
generations around the world but that weren't available to play
on Facebook," said Fahad. "The idea was to help communicate
cultures and break down language barriers by letting people play
games that are culturally significant for them with other players
around the world." He eventually became a co-founder and saw
Popover Games
sold to casino games-developer Playsino last year.

Fahad currently lives in Los
Angeles and consults for the Saudi government on cyber-technology
and youth-oriented programs as the Foreign Ministry's Head of
Student Affairs, a job he says has been a natural fit.
"After being the head of Facebook in Arabic and having that
experience, it felt very natural to be asked to advise,
especially after things happened with the Arab Spring," he said.
"I'm very happy."

He's just turned 30 and he's a
veritable expert on technological growth in the Middle East, but
he has a refreshingly funny and youthful attitude. When
asked where he would like to see himself in ten years, he said
(without a twinge of sarcasm) that he hopes he can have a
penthouse on Mars.

But he also hopes to see the
Middle East back on top: "In 10 years I want to see countries in the
Arab world back in their rightful place as a global leaders and
contributors," he said. "There's an opportunity for me to jump
between different industries and I hope to play a part in
re-introducing the Middle East to the world in the right
way."